cotton prototypes

I can't find my camera, so until I do I can't post any pictures of my own, so in the meantime my writing will just have to do. Lame, I know. Anyways, I'm trying to make a blessing dress for Jensen. Yes, I have two other blessing dresses I made for and used on my other three girls, but they are both far too big for Jensen. What can I say, she's a smurf. So my plan is to sew one in a smaller size for Jensie.

To start, I bought 3 yards of Silk Dupioni last week, and instead of paying $75, I was able to get it for only $25 for all three yards (yay!). But, I have no intention of cutting into that beautiful bunch of expensive silk until I have the perfect dress pattern to us it with. So, I am in the midst of using some inexpensive cotton fabric to test out several different dresses, to make sure I not only get the sizing for Jesen right, but the overall look and style of the dress. It would kill me to sew up a dress with any old pattern using that gorgeous silk, just to end up with "any old dress". I want it to be just right for Jesen. Well, "just right" in my mind at least.

So my first test dress turned out allright, but it wasn't quite right. It's a good thing that I have three more dresses cut out and ready to try again. I feel good about my chances of getting it right soon. And whatever dresses I have left I will give to the D.I. so that some other little baby will be able to use them since it looks like I will most likely end up with 3 or 4 dresses made from the same purple print fabric once I'm done.

(pic of silk dupioni courtesy of google)